1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method of a performance determination test for storage devices, and particularly to a method of a reassign block processing time determination test for hard disk drives that are magnetic storage devices.
2. Description of the Related Art
The recording area in a hard disk (magnetic disk) drive used as a storage device in a computer system is divided into a plurality of blocks defined by logical block addresses (LBAs). Hard disk drives also have available area where data are recorded instead of in blocks where defects have occurred. The available area is configured of a plurality of reassign blocks, with one reassign block being assigned to one defective sector. The hard disk drive, when it has judged that a defect has developed in a block corresponding to a given LBA, executes reassign block processing to assign a prescribed reassign block to the given LBA in place of the defective block, and to record data corresponding to the given LBA in the assigned reassign block.
Conventionally, performance determination tests for hard disk drives have been tests that judge whether or not the reassign block processing can be executed normally. In recent years, however, hard disk drives are increasingly being used in so-called RAID (redundant arrays of inexpensive disks) environments. In such cases, the time required for the reassign block processing can cause problems.
FIG. 7 is a model diagram of a computer system running in a RAID environment. In FIG. 7, a plurality of hard disk drives (HDDS) 10 are connected in parallel to a RAID card 11. A server 12 connected to the RAID card 11 can simultaneously access the plurality of hard disk drives 10 through the RAID card 11.
In this case, if the time required for data recording in a prescribed hard disk drive according to a write command sent from the server 12 to the prescribed hard disk drive 10 exceeds a prescribed time, the RAID card 11 recognizes an error (time out error). More specifically, when there is no defect in the LBA for the hard disk drive wherein the data are recorded, data are normally recorded within that prescribed time. When there is a defect in the LBA, however, the abovedescribed reassign block processing is executed, and the time for that reassign block processing sometimes exceeds the prescribed time. In other words, hard disk drives wherein the reassign block processing time exceeds the prescribed time cannot be used in the RAID environment.
Thus, although the reassign block processing time in a hard disk drive is a critical factor in judging the performance of the hard disk drive, performance determination tests have not conventionally been conducted to determine reassign block processing times.